Syrians Promise to Quit Lebanon By Month's End, U.N. Envoy Says

By DEXTER FILKINS

Published: April 4, 2005

A United Nations envoy said Sunday that Syria's leaders had promised to pull out all of their military and intelligence forces from Lebanon by the end of the month, before the nationwide elections scheduled for late May.

In a statement, Terje Roed-Larsen, the United Nations envoy to Lebanon, said the Syrian foreign minister, Farouk al-Sharaa, had assured him that ''all Syrian troops, military assets and the intelligence apparatus will have been withdrawn fully and completely'' by April 30. Mr. Roed-Larsen issued the statement after meeting with Mr. Sharaa and President Bashar al-Assad.

The withdrawal of Syrian forces, which have occupied parts of Lebanon since 1976, is one of the central demands of the Lebanese opposition, whose supporters have staged huge rallies over the past six weeks demanding that Syria withdraw.

Those demonstrations were set off by the assassination of the former prime minister, Rafik Hariri, on Feb. 14. The protests set in motion a series of events here that have been transforming Lebanese politics. Many Lebanese blame the Syrian government, and its clients in the Lebanese government, for the killing.

Still, the announcement on Sunday was overshadowed by the continuing political deadlock here in the Lebanese capital, which seemed increasingly likely to result in a delay in the nationwide elections, Lebanese opposition leaders said.

Many Lebanese accuse the Syrian leadership of causing the deadlock to prolong the reign of the current Lebanese government, which has supported the Syrian occupation. The popularity of the sitting government leaders has declined sharply since Mr. Hariri's death.

The Syrian withdrawal has been a longstanding requirement under the Taif agreement, signed by the Syrians in 1989, which ended the Lebanese civil war. A United Nations Security Council Resolution, sponsored by the United States and France, reaffirmed that demand last fall after the Syrians engineered the extension of the term of their Lebanese ally, President ?ile Lahoud.

Mr. Sharaa, speaking at a news conference, said that ''by its full withdrawal from Lebanon, Syria would have implemented'' the requirements of the United Nations resolution. He suggested, however, that the pullout would not end his country's influence in Lebanon, which has been dominated by Syria for more than a quarter-century.

The close ties between Syria and Lebanon, Mr. Sharaa said, ''cannot be annulled by the withdrawal of the forces or by incitement for the purpose of breaking Syria-Lebanese relations.''

Syrian troops first entered Lebanon in 1976, during the civil war, saying that they intended to bring stability to the country.

Syria has been pulling troops out for weeks, drawing down its force to about 8,000 from 14,000. Syrian forces have vacated the western parts of Lebanon. Syria had said in mid-March that it would withdraw its troops but did not make a commitment to have them out by a specific date.

The withdrawal of the Syrian troops would remove one of the main concerns of the Lebanese opposition; that Syrian security networks would try to influence the outcome of the elections if they were held next month.

Yet for the Lebanese opposition, the satisfaction in securing a Syrian promise for withdrawal was diminished by the political impasse in Lebanon that is threatening to delay the elections past their May 31 deadline.

Last week, after announcing that he intended to quit, the pro-Syrian prime minister, Omar Karami, changed his mind, saying he would stay on to draw up a new electoral law before the elections. Mr. Karami, who resigned after huge street demonstrations last month, had been asked by President Lahoud to try again to form another government.

After weeks of trying, Mr. Karami failed to reach an agreement with members of the opposition, whose membership in a new government he had been insisting on. But on Friday, Mr. Karami dropped that requirement, opting for a new election law instead.

Under Lebanese law, elections have to be called at least 30 days before they are held. With the legal mandate of the current Lebanese Parliament expiring at the end of May, by most interpretations, Parliament has only a couple of weeks left to call the elections. If Parliament fails to do that, then it will have to extend its term.

Members of the Lebanese opposition contend that the real objective of Mr. Karami and his Syrian backers is to put off the elections for as long as possible and to extend the life of the current pro-Syrian Parliament.

''There is still time, but they don't want there to be time, because they know they will lose the elections,'' said an opposition leader, Nabil de Freige, of the pro-Syrian Lebanese leaders. ''The Syrians are being much more clever.'' He added, ''But this, the Lebanese will not accept.''

As the political impasse drags on, there have been growing concerns about violence. In the past two weeks, four bombs have exploded in Christian neighborhoods in and around Beirut.

The growing violence, which has revived memories of the civil war here, has prompted Lebanese to call on their leaders to break the deadlock before things get worse.

''In the Middle East, all political impasses end in violence,'' Chibli Mallat, a law professor and opposition leader, said in a recent interview.

Photo: A Syrian soldier in eastern Lebanon last week. Syrian forces have occupied parts of Lebanon since 1976. (Photo by Adnan Hajj/Reuters)(pg. A10)